


it's nice (to have a friend)

by mythology1746



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:35:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25336237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mythology1746/pseuds/mythology1746
Summary: “I didn’t need your help.”“Sure, but I wanted to offer some. Come sit with us—you have bio after lunch, right?"There was an awkward silence until finally Nico nodded.“Come sit with us for the rest of lunch—I saw you dropped your lunch and I have an extra sandwich—and we can go to class together after.”“Why?”“Why not?”“We’re not…friends.”“All friendships have got to start somewhere.”
Relationships: Jason Grace & Leo Valdez, Jason Grace/Piper McLean (mentioned), Nico di Angelo & Jason Grace
Comments: 8
Kudos: 46





	it's nice (to have a friend)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [With the Lights On](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3909424) by [nikkiRA](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikkiRA/pseuds/nikkiRA). 



> Hi friends! I got weirdly motivated during quarantine and wrote this one night at like 2AM. It's based on my favorite fanfic With the Lights On by nikkiRA—100% not necessary to read that but 1000% recommend because it's amazing. I've read it like ten times in quarantine. This is just a prequel about an event that's mentioned in that story. Happy reading!

Nico di Angelo hated lunch hour.

Frankly, Nico wasn’t a fan of high school over all, but lunchtime was when he felt this dislike most keenly. As a freshman, he already would have been at the proverbial bottom of the food chain, but add on the fact that he wasn’t what anyone would call outgoing…it usually meant grabbing an empty seat in a corner, because he didn’t get to have a nice designated clique to sit with.

Next year, his sister Hazel would be at school with him, and if he was lucky, they’d end up with the same lunch hour. Regardless, that was at least ten months away, and he was unlikely to be lucky—luck wasn’t really his thing.

Today was weird on its own, though.

Last night, he’d gone over to the Sera’s house after school—Nico’s father thought he needed to spend more time around kids his age, and Aaron Sera went to the same school as Nico and was fifteen. He’d been over once or twice before, but last night…

Well. It was…nice. Now, though, a day later, he didn’t know exactly what to do. He hadn’t seen Aaron this morning—not exactly unusual—but now, at lunch, he was sort of expecting the two of them to talk. At least a little.

He had to circle the cafeteria twice but he found Aaron sitting with some other sophomores that Nico had never seen before, near the middle of the room. This was far enough out of Nico’s zone of comfort that he figured he would just talk to Aaron later—after school, maybe, or tomorrow—but Aaron caught his eye and gestured him over.

Nico got a couple of weird looks as he crossed the room, but he walked as quickly as he could. He was about four tables away when, for some reason, Aaron jumped up onto the table he was sitting at, surprising Nico enough that he came to an abrupt halt.

“Hey everyone!”

Nico glanced around. One of janitors rolled his eyes at Aaron’s antics, and a lunch lady sent over a withering look, but none of the other adults reacted, not even the security guard, who looked half asleep over in the corner.

“I don’t know if any of you know my friend over here. This is Nico. And last night, he tried to _kiss me_.” Aaron laughed—harshly, Nico thought, though he could have been imagining that.

Everyone in the cafeteria was suddenly staring at him.

Aaron said something else—Nico definitely heard some foul words, but his ears were ringing. He thought he might pass out.

When he finally gathered his wits, Nico spun around, his lunch tray clattering to the floor. Aaron had stopped monologuing, but everyone else was starting to laugh. A few people had started pointing.

Luckily, no one got in his way as he fled.

The cafeteria was in the middle of one of the courtyards, where some kids chose to eat lunch on the scattered benches, though there were usually more security guards outside and a couple of teachers chose to eat outside, which meant there weren’t many people to stare as Nico practically sprinted across the grass.

He didn’t really know where he was going, but he needed to leave _right now_.

The student lot was fenced in to keep kids from driving away halfway through the school day, but there was a gap in the fence that teachers hadn’t bothered to fix because it wasn’t terribly large. Nico had never tried it, but he was skinny, and suspected he could squeeze out and get off property. It was certainly more likely than him walking out the front door.

He snapped out of his haze when he literally ran into some guy—Nico had never seen him before, but judging by the fact he was about a head and a half taller, was probably a junior or senior.

There was a group of them, standing in the midst of a bunch of cigarette butts, scattered on the pavement.

The guy Nico had run into grabbed him and shoved him over.

Another thing not new to Nico was bullying. He was scrawny and had no friends. Something about that combination of factors meant that he was an easy target—there was no one to stick up for him, and he wasn’t going to go tattling to teachers. Still, he usually managed to avoid the real assholes. He tended to blend into the background, and he kept his eyes open, so he could typically be far away by the time people remembered he existed.

That wasn’t going to help him now, not when he was already sprawled at their feet.

Nico closed his eyes, bracing for impact—

An impact that never came.

“Hey, dickwads, don’t you have better shit to do?”

Nico opened his eyes. A guy from some of Nico’s classes had walked over. Nico didn’t know him well—he was pretty sure the guy’s name was Jason Grace. The two of them had never spoken. Jason was a jock—tall, blond, broad, a starter on the football team despite being just a freshman, Jason was literally the exact opposite type of person Nico would ever attempt to speak to.

The guy that had shoved Nico sneered. “Don’t _you_ have better shit to do than protect losers, Grace?”

Calmly, Jason said, “Not really.”

Nico was certain that _both_ of them were about to have their asses kicked.

He was surprised, then, when the guys grumbled and took off. Nico watched them go in something akin to confusion.

Jason turned to him. Nico wondered briefly if he was going to get beaten up by _Jason_ now.

“Nico, right?” He spoke in the same calm, unbothered voice.

Nico realized he was still on the ground. “Uh, yeah.”

“C’mon, they’ll call your parents if you ditch now.”

Nico squinted. He considered the possibility that he’d hit his head on the pavement and was now hallucinating. “No one’ll notice.”

Jason offered his hand. “Someone told Aaron he was being a dick and chased him off. It’ll be fine.”

Cautiously, Nico grasped it and allowed Jason to pull him to his feet. Later—years later—he would learn that it was Leo Valdez, the kid that seemed unable to take _anything_ seriously, that tore Aaron a new one as Jason went after Nico.

Instead of gratitude, the next thing Nico said was, “I didn’t need your help.”

Jason raised an eyebrow, looking amused. “Sure, but I wanted to offer some. Come sit with us—you have bio after lunch, right?”

There was an awkward silence until finally Nico nodded.

“Come sit with us for the rest of lunch—I saw you dropped your lunch and I have an extra sandwich—and we can go to class together after.”

Nico was…suspicious. “Why?”

“Why not?”

_Aren’t you an asshole football player?_ didn’t seem like a proper response. “We’re not…friends.”

Jason shrugged. “All friendships have got to start somewhere.” Nico didn’t react, so Jason added, “Leo’s going to get annoyed if we keep him waiting. The longer we take the more he’s going complain about it when we finally get there.”

He said this as though Nico even knew who Leo was. Nico only knew who Jason was because Jason was obscenely popular.

“You want to make friends…with me?”

“Yeah.” Jason said this simply, as though people went around offering Nico their friendship all the time—as though he were the type of person that would have _anyone_ wanting to offer friendship. As though this wasn’t brand new territory for him.

“Uh.” Nico looked around, but Jason was clearly not going to give in. “Okay?”

Jason smiled.

The next day, Nico fully intended to go back to sitting alone in a corner of the cafeteria. He’d seen Jason in two of his morning classes, but Jason was always surrounded by people, and he seemed content with the amiable nods that Nico offered.

However, the second Nico sat down at a reasonably empty table, Jason and Leo materialized out of nowhere and joined him.

The weirdest part was that neither of them commented on it. They usually sat in the middle of the cafeteria; yesterday, even as Jason and Leo attempted to coax some kind of conversation out of Nico, people meandered by and said hello. They mostly just ignored Nico, although a few people shot him weird looks, as though he didn’t quite belong.

Nico assumed that tucking himself away in the corner would be enough of a deterrent for Mr. Popular to join him.

Nico assumed wrong.

He was sitting there for maybe two minutes when Jason settled across from Nico, looking like he did this every day. Leo sat down next to Nico.

Leo was in the middle of speaking. “…and I’m just saying, Jason, if you don’t ask her out, that asshole Dylan is going to do it, and that’ll just be upsetting for everyone.”

Jason rolled his eyes. “Even _if_ Dylan asks her out, she’s not going to say yes. Piper’s not into that.”

“As far as you know.”

“Who’s Piper?” Nico asked this without even thinking, and then cursed himself silently. It was stupid to try and butt in on a conversation he wasn’t part of.

Jason seemed to take this in stride, however. “Piper McLean. She’s in our history class. Sits in the fourth row, all the way on the left.”

Nico frowned. “Brown hair? Looks like she stuck it through a meat grinder?”

“Yeah,” said Jason, with a goofy smile.

Leo burst out laughing. “Dude, just ask her out.” He elbowed Nico. “Nico, tell Jason he’s being an idiot.”

Nico wondered what happening. Was this a setup? If he called Jason an idiot, he would definitely beat Nico up. “Uh…”

Jason rolled his eyes at Leo. “I don’t want to mess up our friendship, y’know?”

“Even if she _doesn’t_ want to go out with you—and she _totally_ does—I don’t think she’ll hate you for asking her out.”

“It’ll be _weird_ , though.”

“She’s literally going over to your house on Saturday!”

“To play video games!” Jason made an exasperated gesture with his arms. “Does that mean I should ask _you_ out next time you come over to play _Mario Kart_?”

“I’m flattered, but you’re not my type.”

“You don’t _have_ a type, Leo.”

…was Nico being mocked? He was pretty sure both Jason and Leo were straight, and in Nico’s experience, straight guys didn’t like to even insinuate that they might be so much as have even platonic feelings for other dudes.

Leo didn’t seem to notice that Nico was sitting there, panicking. He just pressed on. “The video games thing is definitely just an excuse, man. She wants you to ask her out.”

“Am I just supposed to take your word for this? You’ve never _had_ a girlfriend.”

“Yeah, but I know Piper.”

Jason turned to Nico. “What do you think I should do?”

“Me?”

Jason shrugged. “I need a new perspective.”

Nico blinked rapidly. “Uh. Uh. I don’t know. I don’t even know Piper.” _I don’t even know_ you, _really_ , he added silently.

Leo cackled. “Tell Nico here all about Piper.”

“We met over the summer—my dad was doing some kind of legal thing for her dad. She’s really cool, we hung out a bunch. We only have two classes together, but we talk a lot. But she’s great. She’s so easy to talk to, and she’s clever, and funny, and—”

“And Jason is in love,” Leo said. “ _So_ in love.”

“I mean. It kind of. Sounds like you like her.”

Leo clapped Nico on the shoulder, rather aggressively. “Ha! Nico agrees with me!”

Nico shrugged Leo off. “I guess.” Jason was staring at him, so he added, “Is Piper here, anyway?”

“No,” Jason sighed. “She has a different lunch hour ‘cause she has choir this period.”

Leo snickered. “Much to Jason’s utter disappointment. _And_ he can’t even impress her with the fact he has his own personal driver that picks him up ‘cause he always has to go to football practice.”

“Dude, shut up.”

Nico rose an eyebrow. “You have a personal driver.”

Jason flushed. “No. Well, I mean, my dad likes to make sure that I get home safe. I don’t have a _personal driver_.”

Leo snorted. “Jason’s dad is loaded, don’t let him downplay it. He used to be a senator.”

Jason shot Leo a withering look, then glanced at Nico. If Nico didn’t know better, he’d almost say that Jason looked embarrassed.

Nico felt the need to reassure him. “It’s fine. My dad…also has money. He owns all those funeral homes.”

Jason’s eyes lit up, but Leo just sighed heavily. “Outnumbered by the one percenters.”

In spite of himself, Nico snorted. “Poor you.”

For a split second, he was sure that Leo was going to be offended, but then both he and Jason broke out laughing.

Jason finally said, “You’re the one choosing to be here.”

Leo just flipped him off.

Jason and Leo sat with Nico for the rest of the week—just two more days—but Nico was certain, as he came back from his weekend, that they would be over whatever weird reason they had for sitting with him would have been forgotten about.

To his surprise, they were already sitting at the spot they’d sat at the previous week, tucked away in the corner despite the fact Jason should by all means have returned to his spot in the middle of the cafeteria. Jason talked mostly about his time hanging out with Piper—“Y’all were having such a great time and yet you _still didn’t ask her out_ , c’mon, man!”—even though Nico was pretty sure that Jason and Leo saw each other outside of school, or at least outside of lunch, and could have talked about this without him.

The next day, Nico woke up early and packed himself a peanut butter sandwich and a bag of chips so that he could avoid the cafeteria entirely, because he was starting to feel weird, sitting with Jason and Leo. He found a bench partially hidden from view of the cafeteria by some shrubs, and kicked his feet up to eat his sad lunch.

All of this, however, didn’t seem to deter the two of them, because they found him five minutes later. Leo nudged Nico’s feet away—easy to do, because the second he figured out what Leo was doing, Nico swung his legs off—and sat. Jason settled on the ground in front of them.

“Decided on a change of scenery?” Jason asked, though he didn’t sound annoyed.

Nico didn’t want to admit he was trying to dodge them, so he just shrugged and nodded.

Jason just nodded, and didn’t comment on the fact Nico usually bought his lunch. “Anyway, football practice was canceled today, so we’re gonna go to my house to study for that English test on Thursday. Do you want to come?”

Nico just…stared. He was sure the silence was awkward, and he briefly wondered if he just never said another word, Jason and Leo would get tired of whatever it was they were trying to do and go away. But Jason didn’t seem like he was getting annoyed, just patiently waiting for Nico to find the will to make his voice work.

Finally, he managed to choke out some kind of ascent, and Jason said “Great! I can give you a ride” and then Leo started talking about something—Nico’s ears were ringing too loudly for him to understand him.

The rest of lunch passed in a weird haze, and maybe Nico contributed to the conversation, but it was pretty much just as likely that he sat there with his mouth hanging open the whole time.

An hour later, sitting in his sixth period and completely devoid of both Jason and Leo, was when Nico could finally think again. He hadn’t been invited another kid’s house since…well, maybe ever—the Seras’ house notwithstanding, given that that was mostly because of his dad. Jason seemed nice enough, but Nico still couldn’t really fathom what was happening. No one ever wanted to be Nico’s friend, because Nico didn’t really have that much to offer—painfully awkward silences, maybe a cutting remark here and there. Not exactly the foundation for an amazing friendship, as far as Nico was aware.

He could just go straight home after school. Jason didn’t have his phone number, and quite possibly didn’t even know what Nico’s last class was, so Nico could probably make a clean getaway. It would probably be an easy way to make lunch go back to normal, given he’d already told them he would go over later. Plus, he’d have to text his dad to cancel his ride and explain he was going to someone’s house, and his dad knew that Nico didn’t have any friends.

Nico had _almost_ resolved not to go, when he abruptly thought of Bianca. Bianca, who definitely would have encouraged him to make friends, who he could _picture_ how disappointed she would be, if she she had ever heard that he wasn’t at the very least _trying_.

Under his desk, he sent a text: _Father, will be studying for a test after school, I’ll find my own way home._

So maybe Jason and Leo wouldn’t ditch him _this_ week. It’d probably happen by the end of the month.

It didn’t.

**Author's Note:**

> How did the bullies beat Nico outside? Who knows. A question for the ages. Hope y'all enjoyed :) Find me on tumblr @arianne-daniels


End file.
